Border War
Project Gunrunner
Design by Joseph W. Kelly, Photo: ©iStockphotos

Project Gunrunner

The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms purposely allowed over a thousand guns — likely many thousands — to be sold to Mexican drug cartels. ...
Andy Ramirez

For Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry and ICE Special Agent Jaime Zapata …

It was 11 days until Christmas and Detroit-born Brian Terry was looking forward to leaving the U.S.-Mexico border at the end of the week for a holiday visit with his family in his home state of Michigan. He had joined the Border Patrol three and one-half years before and had quickly excelled, becoming a member of the elite BORTAC (Border Tactical) Unit detailed out of the Naco, Arizona, station. A rugged, muscular, 6-foot-4 athlete, prior to the Border Patrol he had served four years in the U.S. Marine Corps — including a combat tour in Iraq during Desert Storm — had gone on to college, and then served nine years as a police officer in Lincoln Park, Michigan, a downriver suburb south of Detroit.

On the night of December 14, 2010, Agent Terry was on duty in the Rio Rico area of Southern Arizona about 15 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border. He and three fellow BORTAC agents were summoned to Peck Canyon, one of the many rural pathways alongside Interstate 19 that are notorious as transport routes for smugglers of drugs, humans, and other contraband. Peck Canyon is also notorious as an area plagued by Mexican bandits known as “rip crews” who prey not only on the smugglers and illegal aliens, but also on hikers, ranchers, local police, and Border Patrol agents. Robbery, rape, and murder have become the bandits’ stock in trade. As in so many other areas along our southern border, the rip crews are usually heavily armed, with full-auto machine guns. These areas are assigned to BORTAC Units, a sort of Special Forces for the Border Patrol, composed of tough, highly trained, well-armed, expert marksmen who know the terrain. They are the only units deemed capable of handling both the harsh physical environment and the vicious desperados that populate it.

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